Power unseen

Microbes - tiny, unseen bacteria, viruses, fungi and protozoa - pervade every aspect of human society and of the natural world. They provide all of our daily food; they were the original source of the world's abundant oil supplies; their presence in soil is essential to the existence of life itself. They also cause horrendous epidemics, from the plague and smallpox of past centuries to the continuing pandemics of cholera and today's growing AIDS crisis. Microbes have vanquished armies swinging great military campaigns even more effectively than the strategies of generals or the machinations…